White Lies
by ElanLauren
Summary: Hermione intends to stop her diet when she gets back to how she was last year - but can she stop? Seventh year, but Dumbledore's alive, Voldemort hasn't taken over, Ron still with Lavender and Harry didn't kiss/date Ginny. Descriptions of how she looks are her thoughts, not how she really looks. Eating disorder possibly self-harm in later chapters **Possibly triggering**
1. Chapter 1

_This story starts in the summer holidays before Hermione's seventh year at Hogwarts. It ignores about half of the Half Blood Prince - Ron is still with Lavender, Ginny didn't kiss/go out with Harry, Voldemort didn't take over and Dumbledore is not dead._

_I hope you enjoy the story :)_

Hermione lay down on her bed and silently stared at the ceiling. She had switched her lamp off but there was light creeping in under the door and round the curtains, as the long summer day had not yet darkened. She glanced over at the desk, at the small pile of letters she'd received in the last six weeks. Most were from Harry, telling her about staying with Ron. She hadn't even been invited to Ron's house, and though she wrote long letters telling him what she'd been doing, Ron's replies had been very short. He obviously didn't want to talk to her very much. Then again, he was back with Lavender again – he couldn't even write a letter to a girl he'd known for six years. He had to spend every waking moment thinking about the girl who was only interested in snogging his face off.

Hermione had also had a few letters from Ginny, which surprised her, as Ginny was a year and a half younger, and they didn't talk much unless they were at the Burrow. But it pleased Hermione, to know she had another friend – she didn't really have many girl friends. There were four other Gryffindor girls in her year. Two were never around, and the other two were Lavender and Parvati. Lavender was Ron's girlfriend and, along with Parvarti, thought Hermione spent too much time in the library to bother about. Ginny's letters were long and interesting, and Ginny asked Hermione lots of questions, as well as talking about what she was doing at the Burrow. Ginny had also admitted that she still had a crush on Harry, even though she was now dating a Ravenclaw boy in her year. Hermione kept this a secret though – Ginny would be really embarrassed if Harry knew, and Ron wouldn't like the idea of his best friend dating his sister!

Hermione then turned her head to the red badge pinned to the front of her robes. The red _Head Girl _badge. She grinned at this. She was head girl, like she had always dreamed. Her parents were delighted as well, and they had gone out for dinner the day she'd got her Hogwarts letter. However, she was slightly surprised by the head boy. It was Ernie MacMillan, a Hufflepuff – Hermione, along with most of Gryffindor, had expected Draco Malfoy to become Head Boy. He seemed like the type of person who would be chosen. But Hermione was glad it wasn't Malfoy; if he had that much power, he would take advantage of it. Ernie, being a Hufflepuff, was loyal and hardworking, if a little pompous occasionally. Like Hermione, he studied and read a lot, so they wouldn't disturb each other too much in the common room that they would be sharing. Hermione was looking forward to having her own bedroom and bathroom at school, a special privilege for the head students. She could take as long as she wanted in the shower, and keep the light on in her bedroom, which was how she slept best.

Then she looked at her school trunk. It was really full, even though she'd taken out everything she didn't need and repacked it several times. She had lots of books this year, but also had new robes, two sizes bigger than her last set. She sighed at this. She hadn't grown any taller since she last got new robes, but she was heavier. The large amount of homework she'd got the last year meant she'd just stuffed any food at all into her mouth so she could get to the library, and snacked on chocolate when staying up late in the common room. While she had never been overweight, all the other girls were thinner than her; she'd never noticed that before Ron and Lavender started going out, because she'd never cared what people thought of her, as long as they thought she was clever.

'I will lose some weight this year,' thought Hermione, turning onto her side and closing her eyes. 'Just so I'm back to how I was at the beginning of last year.'


	2. Chapter 2

The next day was the 30th August, and the penultimate day of the summer holidays. After checking through all her holiday homework, Hermione went into town to get her last glimpse of the muggle town that she had lived in all her life. She walked past the hairdresser's, where she always used to go every two months. She saw the book shop where she had spent all her pocket money. She passed the swimming pool that she used to go to with her dad every Saturday before the dentist opened and the small church a few minutes away. She even passed her old school, which was the strangest thing. She missed those carefree days of primary school. When she could be clever and have friends, when she had not a worry in the world.

Then she came to the house of one of the girls she had known in primary school. Her name was Jessica, and they had been quite good friends. Hermione wondered if she still lived there. It would be interesting to know what she was like now! So without another thought she opened the gate, walked up to the front door and rung the doorbell. She heard a dog barking inside and then a shadow coming towards the door. It opened and she saw a girl her age there with a look of polite curiosity on her face. Hermione recognised her, this was Jessica!

"Hi," Jessica said. "Who are you? I recognise you from somewhere. Do I know you?"

"Well, you did in Year 6" Hermione replied nervously

Jessica thought for a moment then exclaimed "Hermione!"

Hermione smiled and nodded. Jessica hugged her and Hermione almost fell over!

"I haven't seen you in ages! If your parents didn't still own the dentist's I wouldn't even have known you still lived here! Where do you go all year? You were never home in Year 7 and 8 when I asked your parents! And you don't go to my school, or the one on the other side of town either."

Hermione realised she couldn't tell Jessica she was a witch. Jessica would think she was crazy. Well, she didn't have to tell her everything, just leave some information out.

"I go to boarding school," she said.

"Wow! Your parents must be good dentists." Jessica said in response.

"Well, the school contacted us and ask if I wanted to go there." This was true. She hadn't known about Hogwarts one teachers visited her and told her about it.

"Ah, your brains got you in did they?" Jessica guessed.

"Well, sort of…" Hermione said, not wanting to lie to her.

"Stop being so modest, it's not like you!" Jessica teased. Hermione smiled. This was better than an awkward silence, and she was glad that she didn't have to lie too much.

"So, when are you going back?" Jessica asked. "It can't be long now."

"In two days." Hermione replied

"Oh, that's hardly any time! You should have come and found earlier! Then we could do something fun! I suppose you'll be busy tomorrow, getting ready for school."

"Well, actually I'm all packed and ready to go on the 1st." Hermione said.

"Yay! I need to get a few last things for school at the shopping centre. We can get the bus, it's only half an hour!"

Hermione was surprised, but happy, at how Jessica was acting like they hadn't been strangers for six years. She agreed to go to the shopping centre at 10 the next day.

"You can stay for dinner if you want." Jessica said. "We eat a little late but your welcome to stay."

Hermione remember her resolution for last night. If she ate here there was no way of politely leaving half her dinner.

"No thanks, I'm going out for dinner with my cousin," she lied.

"Oh, OK." Jessica replied. "See you tomorrow though. Remember, 10 am at the bus stop."

Hermione walked towards her house, thinking. She was glad she had something fun to do tomorrow! Then she realised that she was really hungry. She hadn't had anything except a sandwich and a biscuit the whole day. But it was good that she was hungry, right? It meant she'd eaten less than usual. She could skip dinner too, say she had eaten already. She looked at her watch. 5 pm. Too early to say she'd had dinner.

She walked to the library to get a book out, then to it to the park, where she sat on the swing reading it. She got completely lost in the adventure story, and only stopped reading when she realised the light was beginning to fade. It was 8:30! Oh no! She'd said she'd be back by 6:30. She rushed home and was out of breath by the time she got there.

"Hi Hermione," her mum said as she closed the door behind her.

Her parents even notice that she was two hours late home.

"There's some food by the microwave," her mum continued.

"Oh, I've eaten already," Hermione lied. "Do you remember Jessica from primary school? I was at her house. We're going to the shopping centre tomorrow."

"Ok," her mum said, returning to the newspaper she had been reading.

Her parents didn't even care. She could be catching a plane to Australia and they would just reply,

"Ok".

Hermione went up to her bedroom and got out her diary from her secret hiding place, behind the broken bit of skirting board that was normally hidden by her desk. She sat there, trying to decide what to write. She knew what she wanted to write, but couldn't even trust her diary. She replaced it without writing anything and got her pyjamas on. She looked at herself in the mirror. Her cheeks went out a lot when she smiled and her arms and legs looked enormous when she bent them. Eurgh, she thought. I can't be a know-it-all and look like this. People will think I don't even know how to eat healthily, they'll think I'm a stupid hypocrite!

She looked back into the mirror one last time before going to the bathroom to brush her teeth. There were no scales in there, like there were in most houses. She had no clue how heavy she was. 'Too heavy,' she knew was one answer. She knew countless ways to solved this problem - transfiguring something into scales or just using the spell that tells you your weight. But Hermione couldn't remember any spells, and just went to bed. She was very hungry, but she'd told her parents she'd had dinner already, and, being dentists, they didn't approve of snacking. She would just have to accept that she was hungry and get used to it.


	3. Chapter 3

_**Author's Note**__: Thank you for the reviews, favourites and follows (I feel famous!). I wrote the first two chapters in March and didn't plan to continue, but now I am!_

_**PS **sorry it's so short and a bit rubbish!  
_

It was very late by the time sleep came to Hermione, and even then it didn't stay for very long. She woke several times that night, and each time tried to resist the temptation to go downstairs to find food, and willing herself to fall asleep again until morning. However, she finally gave in to her begging stomach, and to her common sense, which told her that realistically, she had to eat something or she'd never get to sleep. She made her way down to the kitchen and ate a couple of biscuits from the big value packet in the cupboard.

But she had this voice somewhere in her sub-conscious thoughts, telling her 'If you can't even survive missing one meal, how are you ever going to succeed?'

How _was_ she ever going to succeed? She'd given in after a day? She _wasn't_ ever going to succeed.

And then, before she knew it, she was eating more biscuits - somehow it seemed like they would take away the guilt of giving in. And they did while she kept eating. But when the whole packet was gone, she felt so guilty and disgusted with herself that tears began to form in her eyes as she crept back to bed. It took her another couple of hours of telling herself off and promising herself that she wouldn't lose control like that again for her to get to sleep.

Hermione woke to the sound of her beeping alarm clock, but just hit snooze, not remembering that she was supposed to meet Jessica at 10. In fact, it was almost 9:30 before she thought about anything other than getting back into her warm, cosy bed. So when she finally did remember, she jumped out of bed in a panic tried got ready as quickly as she could.

'Eugh, I'm so lazy, staying in bed so long,' she said it herself as she ranout the door. Still, at least she'd had no time for the temptation of breakfast in her rush to leave.

Jessica was at the bus stop when Hermione arrived. Though she was surprised at Hermione's uncombed hair and tired eyes, she made no comment and the bus arrived a few minutes later.


End file.
